A man is arrested after showing how an EVM can be hacked. What will they do with him now?

04/09/2010

By Aastha Atray Banan

Poll-axed Hari Prasad collaborated with US researchers to present claims that Indian EVMs can be hacked and tampered with — **Poll-axed** Hari Prasad collaborated with US researchers to present claims that Indian EVMs can be hacked and tampered with
Photo: Indiaevm.Org

IS TECHNOLOGIST Hari Prasad a reformer or a thief? Prasad, a technical coordinator with VeTA (Verifiability, Transparency and Accountability) had recently co-authored a paper questioning claims that Indian electronic voting machines (EVMs) were fully secure. VeTA is a citizens forum that deals with election-related issues.

After an EVM went missing from the Mumbai Collector’s office, where the machines are stored, police claimed it was the one Prasad had used for a televised demonstration earlier this year — showing how the EVMs could be tampered with. In India, they are manufactured by two state-owned companies. The one Prasad is alleged to have stolen was made by the Electronics Corporation of India.

Prasad told interrogators that it was a government official who gave him the EVM; that it was returned; but he cannot recall whom he got it from.

While chief investigative officer API Ravindra Wani claims that his team is looking into “all possibilities”, Prasad’s advocate, M Kalyana Rama Krishna, is convinced that his client, who was arrested from his Hyderabad home on 21 August, is being framed.

“Last month, he was summoned by the Mumbai Police to appear as a witness, in case he was acquainted with the facts,” Krishna says. “But he could not make it, because that same day (10 July) he had a meeting with Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) SY Qureshi. So I sent a telegram to the police. Prasad had then told me that the CEC had promised to take action regarding the EVMs.

“But on 14 August, while he was attending to a sick relative in Visakhapatnam, he got a second summon asking him to appear as a witness. We sent another telegram with his tickets attached, days after which he was arrested.”

Krishna’s argument is: Had Prasad really been guilty, would he have gone to meet Qureshi? And would not the CEC have ordered his arrest? His petition will press the point once Prasad completes his police remand on 26 August.

MUMBAI IS rife with rumours of a frameup, with VeTA having the silent backing of the media and advocacy groups. According to Prasad’s video — made in collaboration with researchers from the University of Michigan — Indian EVMs are vulnerable in two ways. First, by replacing a certain part of the machine, it was possible to programme it for stealing votes to favour a particular candidate; and the instruction to steal could even be sent from a mobile phone. Then again, hackers could use a pocket-size device to alter the number of votes stored in an EVM between the polling and the counting of votes — which in India can take weeks.

Opposition parties, including the BJP and the Left, had raised fears of EVMs being susceptible to hacking. But the then CEC, Navin Chawla, dismissed the claims saying private manufacturers, who had failed to sell their machines, were behind the propaganda.

Says VV Rao, VeTA’s national coordinator and the main petitioner in the Supreme Court against the use of EVMs: “After conducting surveys in eight states, I had listed the various problems plaguing the EVMs, of which Prasad and his team gave a practical demonstration.” Although the EC challenged their findings, and came out in support of the manufacturers — who slapped a case on VeTA that has since been withdrawn — the watchdog has continued with its mission.

aastha@tehelka.com

The Mystique In His Calculations

Aastha Atray Banan

28/08/2010

A new play bravely traces the genius of Ramanujan, but does it thicken the mist around mathematics it wanted to clear, asks Aastha Atray Banan

Disappearing genius UK based Complicite’s play recreates a lost passion for math, through the story of Ramanujan Photo: Joris Jan Bos

IF YOU’RE the type that puts the numb in numbers, if you ever sat in math class convinced that every passing moment was draining the very soul out of you — Simon McBurney’s play, A Disappearing Number will be nothing short of a revelation. Recently staged in Mumbai by the UK-based theatre group Complicite, the plot of the story explores the unusual relationship between the legend Srinivasa Ramanujan and Cambridge University don GH Hardy.
In spite of his negligible formal training, Ramanujan is legendary for his contributions to mathematical analysis, number theory, infinite series and continued fractions — in short, he was what present-day mathgroupies would describe as a rockstar. For arithmophobes, the non-linear narrative locates math in a place one would never imagine — as art.
As the play weaves through different time zones and spaces — from Chennai’s bustling streets to Cambridge’s quiet surroundings — it describes Ramanujan’s life through music, dance and a continuous exchange of emotions through eras. “I guess the story could not be told in a linear way because not much is known about Ramanujan’s life, apart from his mathematics. In many ways, it defines him. One could almost say it engulfed him,” says Mrudul Bapat, a professor of mathematics who took students from her BSc class to watch the play.
Although Bapat hopes that the experience will result in a renewed zest for the subject in her students, she also feels that the production mystifies math too much. “He was a genius. His math was based entirely on intuition. He hardly ever needed to put his calculations on paper. So it was quite literally like creating formulae out of the thin air,” she says, adding with a pause, “But that doesn’t mean all mathematicians are like that.”
THE MAIN body of work is interspersed with the presentday story of a globe-trotting Indian-American businessman, and his math-lecturer partner. The partner travels to India in search of Ramanujan’s legacy and eventually dies in his land of birth. British actor David Annen, who plays the role of Hardy, finds the race dynamic of the story more interesting, “Hardy never saw Ramanujan as black or white or brown. He just saw his genius and in a way he discovered him. That’s why he described it as the one ‘romantic incident’ of his life. Even the modern-day love story is so touching that it will reach out to each member of the audience.”
For McBurney, who describes math as ‘the only real thing in the world’, the subject is automatically enveloped in an aura of mystique. When Ramanujan, who starts out as a poor south Indian Brahmin, says, ‘It seemed as if Narasimha was tearing out math from my guts’, the viewer can almost see the creative torpor involved in the creation of something as drab as a theorem. “Math is not unlike poetry or art, it involves seeing patterns in abstraction. But to appreciate its ultimate beauty, you still need to practice those formulae!” laughs Bapat.

‘Whenever I grow a beard, my wife calls me a terrorist’

Aastha Atray Banan

21/08/2010

By Aastha Atray Banan

AT THE AGE OF 13, the spirits of the ouija board told Shylaja Gopal that her husband’s name would be Murtuza. She laughed it off, but her mum wrote it down on a paper and kept it, reminded of her own teenage experiments with the ouija board. In 1998, when Shylaja was working as a stewardess based in Chennai, she met a purser called Murtuza Rai on a flight. But at that time, there was another problem — she had a Muslim phobia. “I couldn’t help it. There have been so many terror incidents of late that one tends to be wary,” says Shylaja, 33, sheepishly. Tracing her old prejudices, she says, “I had a friend who had a Muslim boyfriend who would treat her very badly. He wanted to know where she was, who she was with, would tell her what to wear. I just assumed that he behaved that way because he was Muslim,” she says. But one evening spent with Murtuza in Delhi after they flew together was enough to erase her ill-formed apprehensions.
“Once you meet a person who challenges your preconceived notions and prejudices, you can’t help but get swept off your feet. We started dating a month or so after meeting each other,” says Shylaja. They spent four years flying together, getting to know each other better and playing very competitive pool. Finally, it was time to tie the knot. But then, there was a new problem. Shylaja belonged to a Hindu family from Kerala, while Murtuza was the son of a Punjabi father and a Muslim mother. Her parents were quiet and conservative, while he hailed from an Army background and had grown up in a liberal atmosphere. “It was hard to break the news to my parents. I had thought I would have an arranged marriage. My parents had been showing me pictures of potential matches for some time. I told Murtu, ‘you better get married to me or I am picking one of the photos’,” Shylaja remembers. “I knew opposition was inevitable, though later my mum told me she had reconciled to the ouija board’s predictions,” she says.
Everyone had an opinion and they expressed themselves often. “There was bound to be a clash of cultures, but they were in love, so I was sure it was obviously going to sort itself out,” says Ashwin Shetty, Murtuza’s best friend and former roommate. Shylaja’s best friend, Ramya Rai, was not as optimistic. “When you are younger, you think so differently. He was a Muslim and I tried to talk her out of it. I reminded her of how different their backgrounds were. What if he changed after marriage?” she says, adding, “Also, he never liked her partying too much with me when he wasn’t around. So he and I didn’t like each other. I didn’t think it would last,” she says, “but then I saw she was happy with him. So I changed my mind.”
“What was most time-consuming and annoying for both families was deciding a way in which to get married. South Indian, Islamic or Punjabi — that really got everyone’s goat. We finally decided on the safe option of getting our marriage registered,” laughs Murtuza, watching their one-and half-year-old son Rehaan run around. “After that, nobody said anything. Her parents got to know me, and mine got to know her. So they settled down quickly. And now with a grandson, nobody even remembers us anymore.”
TODAY THEY have got everything going for them. Shylaja works for a shoe retail brand, while Murtuza is an aviation trainer. They still are competitive pool players but their son takes up most of their time. Their relationship seems unhurried, relaxed and devoid of drama. “That’s because love is friendship even though that phrase has been a cliché since Kuch Kuch Hota Hai, but that’s why we work. I point out the hot girls to him whenever we go out,” she says. So has she got over her Muslim phobia completely now? “Not really,” she guffaws, “I still tease him every time something happens. In fact… ” He intervenes, “She refers to it all the time. Right now with my French beard, I am called a terrorist. Damn that Bin Laden!”
Photo: MS Gopal

‘My parents couldn’t believe I was rebelling for a Catholic boy’
By Aastha Atray Banan
SHRADDHA KENY’S parents had a simple historical fact to cite when they opposed her marriage to Noel D’cunha, a middle-class Catholic boy. The Saraswat Brahmin family from Goa had been hearing tales of the Christian crusade against the Hindus in Goa. The duo met at the National Institute for the Hearing Handicapped in Mumbai, where Shraddha was an audiologist and Noel was the PA to the director. When they did get married, Shraddha’s father refused to speak to her. But Noel cuts in and smiles, “I think another reason that upset her family was that I was not as well off.” Despite his fury, her father attended the wedding. “I knew he couldn’t stay angry forever. And once they really got to know Noel, I was sure they would like him. But my brother never adjusted, and we don’t even speak to each other now,” says Shraddha. They cook together, take long walks together, but their son Pancham, 14, is their biggest indulgence. “When I cook beef, he asks, ‘Mama, you are killing your mother?’, and I just say I am only cooking for my son and husband.” So would they let their son marry a girl of his choice? “I want him to become a priest and never get married,” says Noel with a big grin.
Photo : Nikita Sawant

‘Even the passport office questions our marriage’
By Aastha Atray Banan

VJ MINI Mathur almost missed meeting her husband, director Kabir Khan, all because she was going to refuse a TV project, citing date troubles. Even Kabir, who was the director of photography for the project, was planning to step away. But as Mini puts it, the day they saw each other “alarm bells rang”, and they ended up completing the project so that they could be with each other. But though it was love at first sight for the couple, Mini knew it was not going to be smooth sailing. “I am a Mathur from Delhi, and Mathurs only marry Mathurs. So the fact that I wanted to marry a Pathan was going to be a hard pill to swallow for my family. So we planned to take a slightly different approach.”
Their slightly different approach turned out to be a brilliant plan. Mini slowly introduced Kabir into her home as a friend — a friend who wowed her father with his knowledge of the world. “He used to travel a lot, and would send me formal postcards. Those postcards were actually meant to be seen by my father, so that he would know what a worldly man Kabir was,” she laughs. “After a few years, my parents asked me why I wasn’t considering Kabir as husband material. My father said that ‘the difference between a Khanna and a Khan is just NA, and that means Not Applicable.”
FOR KABIR, introducing his would-be bride was simpler. His father, a Pathan, had eloped with his mother who was a Telugu. “My grandfather was a high court judge in Hyderabad and was very conservative. My parents went to America to study and got married there, and that caused problems in both families for some time. The fact that they went through such an experience made sure that in our home, we were never raised to give religion that much importance,” says Kabir who has directed films like Kabul Express and New York. The couple got married, keeping both Hindu and Muslim rituals in mind. “We had a registered marriage but I also insisted on having mock pheras, and then dressing up in a sharara for my reception,” she says. Mini admits that cultural differences are inevitable. “For example, they don’t read the namaz but I do the puja.”
The couple’s relationship came into the public eye in 2009 when the director landed up at the passport office as he wanted to visit his wife in Malaysia. A government officer asked him, “How can a Mathur be married to a Khan and how can his wife have a different name and that too from another community?” Kabir was shocked. “Who are these people to ask me that when my Constitution gives me the right to marry who I want?”
After 11 years of bliss, they are now the parents of Vivaan, 7, and a year-old Sairah whose last names are simply Kabir. “For them to understand what their last name means, they need to know what religion is. They also have the freedom to marry who they want. By the time they grow up, this will become a non-issue,” says Mini, concluding, “love is defined by intellectual and emotional bonding. What role can religion play?”

‘My biggest adjustment after marriage was learning Marathi’
By Rishi Majumder

SHALINI THACKERAY, the Mumbai North West candidate for the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) was a prime talking point during the 2009 Lok Sabha elections. Why? Like any other MNS contestant, she espoused the Marathi manoos cause and justified party president Raj Thackeray’s hate campaign against north Indians in the state. And going by the Thackeray family’s protracted list of entrants into Maharashtrian parochial politics, the fact that Shalini is a Thackeray doesn’t stand for much novelty either.
Or doesn’t it? Shalini Thackeray, before her marriage to Jeetendra Thackeray was Shalini Bhagat, a girl from a Punjabi Sikh family based in Rae Bareilly, Uttar Pradesh. She was a ‘north Indian’ by even the MNS’ narrow definition of the phrase. Raj Thackeray likes to set himself apart from other leaders who trade on identity politics. In one of his speeches he had said that by ‘north Indians’ he refers only to those from Rajasthan, UP and Bihar.
But all this was before Shalini’s marriage to Jeetendra Thackeray. In 2009, if Jeetendra’s cousin Raj was the hot new face of Maharashtrian intolerance, Shalini was his sweet foil. Her very existence, it was hoped, would usher in universal appeal for the MNS. Someone had to explain to the world that Raj Thackeray had nothing personal against the north Indians he was lambasting in Shivaji Park and asking to leave. And who better than his north Indian sister-in-law to do so?
Shalini and Jeetendra had met as students in RA College of Commerce, Mumbai. Shalini had run the family business for years before joining politics and is proud of the MBA she acquired in the US. But Jeetendra and Shalini have been with the MNS camp since its inception. Jeetendra was Shalini’s campaign manager during elections. “Joining active politics wasn’t on my mind at all when I first came into the family,” says Shalini. Today, as someone firmly entrenched within the MNS, Shalini is careful to measure everything she says about her family. “Yes, there were adjustments I had to make when I got married,” she admits. This she follows with an instant disclaimer: “But they are the adjustments any girl who gets married into a family with a different cultural background would have to make.” Ask her what the biggest adjustment was in the process of becoming a Thackeray bride and she responds, “Well — the language. I used to know only smatterings of Marathi. But after marriage I had to make it my own.”
ONE IMAGINES that it isn’t easy being a Thackeray. While many individuals who marry into that culture might choose not to adopt the ethos and retain their own, one would imagine that Shalini did not have that option.
But she protests this assumption vociferously: “There was no pressure on me. I chose to accept my family’s tradition and legacy.” And again, she likens all her fears about marrying into the Thackeray family with the “fears any girl marrying into a family with a different cultural background would have.”
What about her children? What if they married non-Maharashtrians? Or ‘north Indians’? “Why look into the future?” she asks. “I will bring them up with an excellent sense of sanskaar. And then I’ll let them make their own choice when they’re at the right age to do so.”
Why look into the future? Because 36 years ago, a fiveyear- old Sikh girl had come into Mumbai from Bareilly. Today that girl is a 41-year-old woman. The woman who says Raj Thackeray is sadly misunderstood is firm that there must be a “cut-off point for migrants into the state”. The catchphrase of her 2009 poll campaign was: “I can cook both puran poli as well as kadhi chawal.”

Bhavana Yadav &<br /><br /><br />
Priyadarshan Pathak<br /><br /><br />
MUMBAI<br /><br /><br />
BEEN TOGETHER 16 years<br /><br /><br />
BIGGEST HURDLE Caste difference

‘Mother forbade me from marrying into a shepherd family’
By Anumeha Yadav
MUSIC TOH banaata hai par kaam kya karta hai?” Her mother’s question haunted Bhavana Yadav when she decided to be with music composer Priyadarshan Pathak. Being the eldest daughter of a Yadav family, marrying a middle-class Brahmin boy was forbidden. Yet when they met at Shovana Narayan’s kathak class in 1994, they couldn’t help but fall in love. Family intervention followed soon after. “My uncles threatened to cut off all ties. One day, after spending four hours explaining my point of view to my mother, she asked me, ‘She is still from a shepherd family, isn’t she?” says Priyadarshan. When he moved to Mumbai to try his luck in Bollywood, Bhavana started facing pressure to meet arranged matches. But their resolve to be together led them to tie the knot in 2000. Not that the years after marriage were perfect. Bhavana struggled to cope with her new life in Mumbai. It was three years before she started her current job as a psychologist. Priyadarshan is still waiting for a break in Bollywood, though he has composed music for teleserials on Doordarshan. Ask them about one thing that has come easily to them and the duo echos, “All these years of togetherness.”
Photos : Nikita Sawant, Tumpa Mondal

Pinki Goes Kinky

Aastha Atray Banan

14/08/2010

Plastic, leather, electric, glow-in-the-dark. Are sex toys bringing zip to the Indian bedroom, asks Aastha Atray Banan
ISN’T SEX a natural desire?” Pinku of Sai Electronics, a roadside stall in a busy lane near Flora Fountain in Mumbai, asks nonchalantly. It’s a great sales pitch for the hoard of vibrators, dildos and sex creams he sells openly alongside cheap radios and pirated movies. “What kind do you want? German? Remotecontrolled? Finger vibrators? Latex? Speak freely. Nobody feels shy anymore. Young girls, boys, aunties, uncles, middle-aged couples — all come and ask for this stuff freely. Then what’s the sharam for?” he smiles as he gets back to professional haggling.

Section 292 of the Indian Penal Code, which defines the term ‘obscene’ makes the sex toy illegal and its sale and distribution, consequently, criminal. But where the IPC has fallen behind the times, Indian couples haven’t and where there is a demand, the enterprising Indian trader is not far behind. Now you can buy finger vibrator in New Delhi’s Palika Bazaar or the battery- operated ‘rabbit’ (Rs 5,000—Rs 10,000) in Mumbai’s Crawford market. And for those with a taste for S&M — whips, masks and naughty outfits from the backrooms of lingerie shops. These are all appropriate gifting options now, especially for couples getting married or from one spouse to another on Valentine’s Day.
In India, the customers are surely not spoilt for choice, but are trying to make ends meet whatever way they can. As psychologist Seema Hingoranny puts it, “Indians want to experiment and they are doing so, but they still feel that if they admit to using a vibrator, that means their sex life was horrible to start with.” But newly-married Samiya Shakeel, 22, regards that as hogwash. She often dresses up as a dominatrix and uses a whip on her husband, and he is certainly not complaining.
“I buy these whips that small lingerie shops in Bandra sell and then I often role play as a dominatrix or a naughty nurse who likes to spank her patients. This whip gives a nice whack on the tushy,” laughs the PR executive. “You have to move with the times. I want to keep my sex life alive. And these toys help me. I am surprised they are banned.”

‘Nobody feels shy anymore. Young girls and boys, aunties, uncles — all come for this stuff,’ says a dildo seller

Namita Gupta, a 24-year-old singleton from Delhi, often buys her fix from a chemist next to her house. “Durex has come out with these finger vibrators, which are too much fun. They also sell cock rings, which your man can wear and double the pleasure.” she says.
Bhavik Shah, a writer from Mumbai, agrees, “My girlfriend and I have tried glowin- the-dark condoms, which themselves make the act so much fun. She also wears this shiny outfit that has a whip attached as a tail. What fun!”
The dildo — dismissed as a “masturbatory machine for sexually dysfunctional females” in The Journal of Popular Culture in 1974 — could be a sign of the slow, silent but rapid sexual revolution taking place in our metros. Indians are edging towards sexual maturity, their growth halted by an anachronistic government. As Elton John once said, “People should be free to engage in any sexual practices they choose; they should draw the line at goats though.”
aastha@tehelka.com

No One Killed Rani

Aastha Atray Banan

14/08/2010

Have you heard the rumours that Rani Mukerji has turned into a recluse, that she sees no one anymore? That she is the new Rekha? Aastha Atray Banan set out to meet her on a rainy night and came away startled

MUMBAI IS FULL of bored jibes about Rani Mukerji. She is over. She smells of failure. She is too short, too old to work in slick, new Bollywood. She is married to Aditya Chopra. She is just living with him like she did with Govinda. The senior Chopras hate her and she has to clear out whenever they are around. They don’t care about her. Alongside snippets about her role in the forthcoming Rajkumar Gupta film, No One Killed Jessica, fly fantastical rumours that she has turned into a Rekha-like figure. Could it be that the girl with the polarising tenor (love it, hate it, deal with it), the caper-loving Babli, the girl who played any number of overwrought, teary good girls has turned into a Garboesque recluse who ‘vants’ to be alone?
Rani is certainly not the kind of actress you trip over at Gloria Jeans in Bandra and chat up. A couple of weeks of phone calls are the investment required for an appointment. On the day, there is a tremendous downpour and Rani is late and you wonder. Has her poor run with men sunk her in self-pity? Has Rani succumbed to depression because of failure? Waiting outside in a Mumbai storm can foster any dark, Gothic ideas you might be nurturing. Reality turns out to be rather different.
In her opulently done Juhu pad, with huge mirrors and vintage rugs, the big, wide trademark smile is in place but Rani Mukerji is an unnerving presence. The warm hazel eyes are steely enough to make you squirm a little in your seat. The cruel tabloids may be dying to feature her in the ‘where are they now’ section but Rani’s aura seems to have magnified several fold. Could it be that she has grown?
At 32, she looks better than she ever has. Yoga has made her slender. Dressed in a short skirt and minimal makeup, she retains a regal air. Lauren Bacall once said, “I am not a has-been. I am a willbe.” Rani would approve of Bacall’s style. It is unlikely she has read the quote though. She doesn’t read, she says. Unlike several young ladies who manufacture reputations as frenetic readers and think that Jane Austen was a Victorian and thinks Omair Ahmed is a medieval poet, Rani says flatly that she does not read. ‘I don’t read much — I have an allergy to the smell of books. Really!’
Rani makes these revelations but this is no invitation to get closer. You are always painfully aware of the Lakshman Rekha around her, one she will never cross and you better not even try to. She has no desire to be thought of as Everywoman. As she makes clear when you gird your loins and ask her about the rumours that she has turned into a hermit. She launches into a surprising and convincing discourse on the nature of fame and how it has changed in the 15 years that she has been in Bollywood. “I blame it on Twitter. Everyone has become so accessible. Today, stars function and manage themselves very differently. They chart down everything they do daily. They give stories about themselves to the press and even about other stars! There are stories about stars buying a new phone, stars fainting… when did this all become news?” she says part resigned, part disgusted.
“When I started, things were done differently and film journalism was not about churning out tabloid titbits. To me, being exclusive and being mysterious is what makes a star. I guess that’s why I haven’t changed at all.” She rarely calls herself a heroine, an actress or even the now-popular actor — only star.

‘To me, being exclusive and being mysterious is what makes a star. I guess that’s why I haven’t changed at all,’ says Rani Mukerji

UP, DOWN, ROUND ABOUT
Even committed Rani haters would find it hard to deny her star quotient. She arrived with Raja ki Aayegi Baraat, but got noticed opposite Aamir Khan in Ghulam (1998). Her breakthrough moment came when she bagged Kuch Kuch Hota Hai opposite her now close friend Shah Rukh Khan, directed by another close friend Karan Johar. (She once described Shah Rukh as the best thing that ever happened to heroines.) With Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s Black and Mani Ratnam’s Yuva, Rani was once at the top of the Bollywood hill. But fame has been fickle. Despite her talent and the much sought-after girl-next-door vibe, things started going downhill soon after.
Heckled at by the press and critics, her alleged love affairs with the much-married Govinda and then the muchmarried Aditya Chopra, added fuel to the fire. Rani remained quiet through it all. And hence began a different rumour mill, which asked why (like Chopra whom only the shadow knows) Rani was never seen in public?

‘She became too uppity after she got famous; that led to her downfall. You shouldn’t let fame get to you,’ says film critic Khalid Mohamed

Sipping hot water out of a mug which has the phrase ‘drama queen’ in big, black letters, Rani looks stoic when asked why she has not cleared the air. “I possibly couldn’t have given a clarification every week. It’s not in my nature to call up a journalist and say, ‘why did you say this about me’. They questioned my character and that really bothered me. I am sure directors got turned off and may have not offered me movies. When I get married, I will tell everyone,” she says.
So she is not a recluse but who are her friends in the industry? The girl next door who has acted in some of the soppiest, why-can’t-we-all-get-along movies of the decade, answers, “Friendship is a complex word. I can only tell you who my real friends are when I am old and my children have left me. The people who will spend time with me then will be my true friends.” As for now, there is her family whom she shares this house with.
Filmmakers who have worked with her, like Kunal Kohli, vouch that Rani has always been reticent and seriously invested in her family. Her Lakshman Rekha is not a new phenomenon but it just suits the new ‘loser’ narrative to make it seem so. At some point in the conversation, she says, “When you are on the top, people want to bring you down. And they will say anything to do so. But I believe in karma, and it will all come back to them.” This is the same cosmic and vengeful balancing of scales that Rani’s detractors have also been wishing for her. Well-known film journalist Khalid Mohamed says, “She became too uppity after she got famous and that led to her downfall. I know a co-star of hers who told me that Rani started telling him ‘how to act’. But see, she came tumbling down. You should not let fame get to your head.” Others are more compassionate and a little more logical. Rauf Ahmed, the first journalist who Rani gave her first interview, speaks of her fondly and adds, “the media is cruel. Even if you mess up once, they take you down badly. And then the whole Aditya Chopra rumour hurt her. And she is so talented, that’s what makes this so sad.”
But “sadness” is not an emotion Rani subscribes to. Instead, you see a small, slightly injured but visibly annoyed human being, who is not going to give her detractors the satisfaction of seeing her retreat without a fight. “I don’t need to sign many movies just to prove I exist, even though this may be the worst time in my career. I don’t need to go to all social events — I go if I am really needed; if someone just sends me a message on my phone, why will I go? I have done my time doing that. But there’s no limit to what I can do.”
AND STRAIGHT AHEAD
In Rajkumar Gupta’s No One Killed Jessica, a film inspired by the Jessica Lall case, Rani plays an investigative television journalist. Would she do a meaty role in a movie even if it wasn’t the lead? In an industry where actors prattle off practised, meaningless answers about meaningful roles, Rani makes it clear that she is not interested in crumbs. She says definitively, as if she has it all planned, “No way. I will always be the star in a movie I am in. I’d love to do a movie with an ensemble cast, but a star always is the star. Whatever role I would do would become the lead, right?”
And that’s another reason why it’s unnerving to sit across Rani. It’s because the coy, politically correct Rani we got so used to hearing about, has metamorphosed into a grownup. The girl who has made a career of being adorable, is no longer interested in pleasing people. Today, even though she has just one release lined up, she is unfazed. But now that Rani has stopped playing cute, can she make a career of it?
aastha@tehelka.com

Few takers in the unorganised sector

Abhishek Anand

31/07/2010

NEW PENSION SCHEME
By Abhishek Anand

THE NEW Pension Scheme (NPS) is set for a makeover. To make it popular, the Pension Fund Regulatory Development Authority (PFRDA) is considering increasing the commission of NPS agents, so that they push the product more aggressively.
NPS allows an investor to save a nest egg for retirement days. Those who opt for the scheme need to open an account and keep investing some money every month for the tenure of their choice.
The proceeds of these accounts are then invested in a mix of equity, government bonds and fixed- income instruments, depending upon age and other factors. The money in the account is divided into two tiers. One portion the investor can withdraw at any time. The second can only be withdrawn after retirement.
But the scheme has failed to attract most private and unorganised sector workers. From 1 May 2009 to 2 July 2010, it managed to win only 9,673 subscribers. “One reason for the poor response could be the low commission paid to the agents. We are considering revising the whole compensation structure,” Yogesh Agarwal, chairman, PFRDA told TEHELKA. Now walk the talk.

Air India is paying millions to hire top talent in its turnaround bid. Will it work?

Abhishek Anand

31/07/2010

By Samiran Saha

Dumped Middle-level employees have never felt more insecure than they do now
Photo : Shailendra Pandey

THE BUZZ these days in Air India Building, Nariman Point, Mumbai — headquarters of the National Aviation Company of India Ltd (NACIL) — is about more new big-ticket appointments. As part of its turnaround strategy, the state-run carrier has lined up a team whose annual emoluments boggle the mind. The April appointment of Gustav Baldauf, former executive vice-president of Austrian Airlines and chief operating officer (COO) of NACIL, which runs Air India (AI), was just the beginning. Now it plans to hire a COO for its low-cost international arm, Air India Express, a chief strategy officer, a chief information officer, a chief communication adviser, and a chief adviser to handle its human resources (HR) issues.
Baldauf being airdropped into a top job may not have been received well by the staff in the middle and junior management cadres, but senior AI officials and industry observers feel that the decision to have a “hands-on” COO will help the flag carrier turn around faster. “There are gaps in our resources and capabilities, and I see no harm in sourcing experienced manpower from outside. Baldauf has come in with a clear mandate and he will work to a plan to turn the airline around in these competitive times,” says a senior AI official who does not wish to be identified. “There have been governing issues in Air India for a long time, and the government now has to decide whether the airline needs technocrats or bureaucrats to run its affairs,” he adds.

Top grosser Gustav Baldauf is being paid Rs 3.14 crore per annum
Photo : Shailendra Pandey

This is the first time that a COO has been hired from outside the ranks of the bureaucracy and given the task of salvaging Air India within three years. The airline also recently recast its board, inducting four new independent directors — Anand Mahindra, vice-chairman and managing director of auto major Mahindra and Mahindra Ltd, Fali Homi Major, former chief of air staff of the Indian Air Force, Amit Mitra, secretary-general of industry lobby FICCI and Yusuffali MA, managing director of Dubai-based industrial house Emke Group. While Mitra will advise the airline on HR issues, Mahindra will help in audit and finance.
But middle-level executives are fuming. “The airline has a huge debt. Earlier, it even found it difficult to pay our salaries on time. But hiring a COO at Rs 3.14 crore per annum is unacceptable,” says one.
According to him there have been no promotions or pay hikes in two years, and he wants to know why the considerable in-house talent within the organisation is not being tapped. His colleague is further peeved that staff from the northern region have been asked to sign a contract that could get them transferred to Air India SATS Airport Services Private Ltd, a joint venture AI formed with Singapore Airlines for ground-handling operations. “We aren’t even sure if we will be retained at all,” he bitterly complains.
BUT THE other side is equally insistent that all this is for the good. An analyst with a global consultancy, for instance, justifies the appointments, saying, “The resentment is justified, but then the staff too needs to understand that the move is aimed at pulling the airline out of the financial quagmire it is in.” He is endorsed by Kapil Kaul, head of the India Practice at the Consultancy Centre for Asia Pacific Aviation.
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HIGHS AND LOWS
> OUTSOURCING
This is the first time that a COO has been hired from outside the airline bureaucracy
> PEER SUPPORT
Many top aviation officials endorse AI’s expensive turnaround strategy
> LOSING AIRLINE
Despite an equity infusion of Rs 800 crore, AI has suffered losses of Rs 15,000 crorey
> BOARD RECAST
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“Getting the right people at the top is critical for an airline that is looking to recover. There should be no compromise on the quality of people being inducted,” Kaul told TEHELKA. And though Ankur Bhatia, executive director of Bird Group, an aviation technologies service provider, concedes that Air India has some seasoned manpower, he too considers it a sensible step. But, it stands to reason that with so much heartburn all around, the airline’s morale will go down still further.
Disturbingly, despite the airline receiving an equity infusion of Rs 800 crore from the government, it has suffered cumulative losses of nearly Rs 15,000 crore, and its market share is 16.9 percent — way behind market leader Jet Airways and Kingfisher Airlines. But right now nobody is asking what makes them tick. All the talk is about AI’s expensive hiring spree.
Civil Aviation Minister Praful Patel recently told Parliament that the national carrier was expected to lose around Rs 5,400 crore this fiscal and that the trend was likely to continue for a few more years. And Baldauf has just three.
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RBI comes to airlines’ rescue
HERE, FINALLY, is some good news for the debtridden aviation industry: the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) is considering a second restructuring package for the sector. Banks have been pressing the RBI to give its nod for this second restructuring package.
If the RBI agrees, the airline companies will have more time to service their massive debt. Besides, it will help banks to maintain higher profitability. Banks have to set aside a certain percentage of their advances as a contingency for loans going bad, or unpaid. Profitability apart, this also limits lending capacity. “Banks have to make provisioning for these bad loans, which impact the profitability of the banking sector,” says a senior bank official.
According to the Centre for Asia Pacific Aviation, three major airline firms together owe $13.5 billion. However,the RBI is likely to retain the “recompense” clause for such loans. Under this, if an airline does well a bank can reverse some concessions, including reduction in the rate of interest. Moreover, banks will lend to aviation firms on a case-to-case basis. Says Ranjan Dhawan, CGM, Punjab National Bank. “For a viable project we will lend to them, despite the sector being in trouble.” Now for a high!
Abhishek Anand
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Why women should not hold on

Aastha Atray Banan

24/07/2010

Women suffer much more than men from the pathetic state of our public toilets. How long before they raise a stink, asks Aastha Atray Banan
FOR KHAN Fahreen Sajid, a resident of the Behram Nagar slum in Mumbai’s Bandra East, the decision of who to marry is going to be the most practical one of her life. All she wants is a toilet — a step up from the slum’s community loo. “I need a house that has an attached bathroom,” she told her father, a zari maker, matter-of-factly.
In Haryana, this realisation dawned early. In 2005, the government started the initiative ‘No Toilet, No Bride’. Slogans of “If you don’t have a proper lavatory in your house, don’t even think about marrying my daughter” were plastered across villages. About 1.4 million lavatories have been built in the state since 2005 and 798 village panchayats have already received nearly Rs 11.29 crore as reward for having a toilet in each household.
When James Brown said, “It’s a man’s world”, he was probably thinking of the long queue outside a women’s loo. Out of Delhi’s 3,192 public urinals, only 132 were for women, according to a Delhi High Court inspection in 2007 and a Centre for Civil Society paper. In Mumbai, Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation officer on special duty Anand Jagtap told TEHELKA that the government makes an equal number of toilets for men and women, with the aim of providing one toilet seat for every 50 people.
But Jagtap’s arithmetic is misleading. Even when the number of toilets are same, male ones have more units since they’re equipped with additional standing- style urinals. This is doubly debilitating when you consider that men and women use toilets differently, and, according to a 1988 Virginia Tech study, women need to spend twice as long in the loo as men.
The Indian man just zips down, faces the next wall and relieves himself. In doing so, he faces no shame or embarrassment — whereas women feel furtive even about using a public loo. Smrithi Rao, a 24-year-old Bengaluru stylist explains, “We are conditioned by birth to feel shame. And I don’t want men to look at me when I am using a loo.”
Kaveri Nag, a retail manager in Delhi, says, “I’m scared I’m going to catch an infection, because most toilets are dirty.I carry toilet paper and cover the seats with lots of it.” She drives from Delhi to Jaipur every week, and is shocked that there is not even one toilet on the threehour long stretch: “Men can just get off and go. What do we do?”
In the Kutch, women are forced to defecate in a hole in their rooms after childbirth as walking to a distant field demarcated for defecation is out of the question, reveals Ila Pathak, a prominent social activist who works for the Ahmedabad Women’s Action Group. Says Pathak, “Most women in rural areas don’t use sanitary napkins, so during the time they are menstruating they stay at home and follow the same routine. Travelling to places almost an hour away demarcated as a women’s loo can also cause unusual problems. If the woman of the house takes a long time coming back from these areas, family members suspect her of having an affair and beat them up!”
And in the Northeast, says Charishma, a PhD student in Shillong: “You can spot men all over the hills and in the main town parking themselves on the side of the roads. But when we go down to the main marketplace every Sunday, we keep in mind that we shouldn’t consume too much liquids, or else we might have to use the dirty loos. We have got used to holding it forever.”
FILMMAKER PAROMITA Vohra’s documentary Q2P asks the all-important question: Who are India’s super cities being built for if there are not even basic facilities for women? Paromita says with a dry smile, “A woman’s body is never seen biologically, only sexually, and so when a woman sees a man watching her as she goes to the loo, she knows he’ll be thinking of her naked body. The fact that women can’t pee where they want and when they want is a proof of their oppression — even in the so-called metros.”
India’s urban women — both rich and poor, by the way — face many problems around their toilet routines, but the dilemma of preserving their dignity is often in the forefront. Take the case of Rukhsana Anwar Sheikh, 35, who lives in a Mumbai slum, and has to cross over to a neighbouring slum every time she needs to visit a decent loo. “I only go to the loo before dark as I don’t want to leave my house after a decent hour. And if my calculations go wrong, I just hold it. Women are supposed to be resilient,” she cracks a weary yet resigned smile.
Some women, though, are ready to challenge society’s farcical attitude. Bharti, Guddi and Sunita — housemaids in Delhi’s Rohini neighbourhood — have decided to shed their inhibitions for the sake of their health. The owners of houses where they work don’t allow them to use the bathrooms, so they hit back by squatting on the main road whenever they feel the need to go, even if they are stared at. “We gave up sharam long time back. If we fall ill, what will happen to our children? It’s not a choice we can afford to make,” says the trio of Rajasthani banjara women.

‘I only go to the loo before dark and if my calculations go wrong, I just hold it. We’re supposed to be resilient,’ says Anwar Sheikh with a resigned smile

Dr Anita Patil-Deshmukh, executive director of Pukar India, agrees that there are health risks to holding back. “They suffer from constipation and piles. Women who hold it in for long periods also suffer from recurrent UTI (urinary tract infection) and hence give birth to premature or small babies. It’s one of the silent killers for women all over India.” A study conducted by think tank Observer Research Foundation (ORF) in 2010, on sanitation facilities at Mumbai’s 106 suburban railway stations, revealed that the ratio of women to men getting UTI was 6:1.
Journalist Brinda Majithia, 25, commutes 90 minutes from far-off Mumbai suburb Kandivali to Lower Parel every day and never uses the railway station toilets. “I have gone eight hours at a stretch without using a bathroom. The only way you can think of using a station loo is if you don’t touch anything.” At her office, too, there is water shortage. “Last month, we were actually forced to go to a nearby mall because our office made no provision for water shortage in the city,” she says. “Men didn’t suffer — they were still able to use the office urinals.”
It is well known that the right to education is hampered by lack of loos in schools. Half of India’s government-run schools don’t have separate toilets for males and females, forcing young women to use unisex facilities or nothing at all. Bina Lashkari of the NGO Doorstep Schools, which works with Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation schools all over Mumbai, says, “Most girls give up coming to school once they hit puberty, as they are wary of using the dirty unisex toilet, especially when they are menstruating.” In Bengaluru, in a school which had no loo, girls would go in twos to the corner of the compound. One girl would shelter the girl peeing by standing in front of her with her skirt spread out! No wonder, a Ministry of Health and Family Welfare health survey from 2006 found that 22 percent of girls complete 10 or more years of schooling compared to 35 percent of boys.
British urban design planner Clara Greed once said that you can judge a nation by its toilets and assess the true position of women in society by looking at its toilet queues. In India, all we can do is hope, and wait with our legs crossed as tight as possible.

Four state-owned insurance firms have blacklisted 150 hospitals for inflating bills. Now what?

Abhishek Anand

24/07/2010

Cut to size Hospitals across the country are known to indulge in fraudulent billing. Now they are paying for it

HOSPITALS across Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai and Bengaluru have been struck off the list of facilities for cashless insurance — a move that will ultimately benefit policyholders. The companies — United India, Oriental Insurance, National Insurance and New India Assurance — are expected to blacklist more hospitals that, in collusion with third party administrators (TPAs), have been grossly inflating bills
Public sector general insurance providers account for close to 70 percent of the health insurance market, and between April and September 2009 they had together collected close to Rs 2,300 crore as health insurance premium. The insurers say they are more than willing to extend their Preferred Provider Network (PPN) — the number of hospitals that provide cashless transaction facility under the medical insurance policy. But the offer comes with a healthy rider: there must be transparency in the billing process
Insurance companies and leading healthcare providers, including Fortis Hospitals, Max Healthcare and Apollo hospitals, discussed the issue in Mumbai on July 13. The three, which are members of the National Committee on Healthcare of the Confederation of Indian Industries (CII), are among the hospitals removed from the PPN list on July 1.
“The hospital industry wants more hospitals to be included in the (PPN) list and we are open to it,” New India Assurance general manager S Gopalakrishnan told TEHELKA. “But we want more people included in the cashless facility category. The benefit should reach everyone and overcharging must end. If a hospital is found engaging in fraudulent practices, it will be struck off the list. If they comply, total transparency can come about in a year.”

Dr Naresh Trehan
Chairman And Managing Director, Medanta Medicity

The insurers’ message appears to have gone home, with the hospitals finally “showing keenness” to address the malaise. Even so, the gap between word and deed remains wide, and so far there is little on the ground to suggest they are as sincere as they are trying to sound. “We have kept our options open. These include reducing fees and various other charges, making billing transparent and helping insurance companies ward off losses,” says Max Healthcare Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director Pervez Ahmed. In the same breath, however, Ahmed claims he is “startled” by the sudden rap on their knuckles. “The unilateral decision is surprising. They held no negotiations on the issue. Individual customers are sure to find themselves in a soup.”
But the insurance companies say they stand by their July 1 decision, claiming that some hospitals charged higher fees from insured patients as compared to those without insurance. This was done through fraudulent billing, they claim — an allegation that gets progressively harder to counter.
Indeed, even Dr Naresh Trehan, chairman and managing director of Medanta Medicity, a Gurgaon-based specialty healthcare provider, says he does not rule out the incidence of fraudulent billing “in some cases”. “But it isn’t widespread,” he insists, adding, “What’s more, insurance companies have failed to establish that bills have indeed been manipulated.”
The insurers will have none of that, and insist they have a strong case. Counters G Srinivasan, chairman and managing director of United India Insurance: “Our claim payment ratio stands at 120 to 125 percent. In many cases we found the bills exorbitantly high and we had no option but to delist these hospitals from the PPN.” Even so, Srinivasanƒ says he understands the kind of problems that are likely to result from the blacklisting. “We will provide cashless transaction even in these hospitals in cases of emergency, and will also add more hospitals under the cashless transaction facility,” he assures.
According to data provided by the watchdog body, the Insurance Regulatory Development Authority (IRDA), the total claim ratio in the case of health insurance during 2008-09 stood at 105.95 percent as against 107 percent a year ago. This means that for every Rs 100 of premium collected, insurance companies paid out Rs 106.
Significantly, the claim ratio in the case of public sector insurers stood at 116.60 percent during 2008-09, as against 85.33 percent for private sector health insurance providers. And only the latter showed improvement in their claim ratios. The losers for the most part were the state-owned companies.
But neither IRDA, nor the General Insurance Council, the apex body of general insurers, is willing to intervene or mediate. While IRDA says the matter is outside its purview, Council secretarygeneral SL Mohan asks, “How can we step in till they approach us?”
THE HOSPITALS meanwhile keep parroting the old line — though every time they do so one detects an underpinning of caution. For, in the same breath that people like Ahmed of Max and Medicity’s Dr Trehan claim the move will only hurt the patients, they slip in the fact that they are not sitting by idly.
Says Dr Trehan: “To avoid that (fraudulent billing) we are ready to bring in more checks and balances, provided they (the insurance companies) also take some corrective steps.” He also wants frequent interaction between hospitals and insurers “to arrive at a mutually beneficial decision, which in turn would benefit policyholders”.
Asked why some hospitals charged higher fees, Dr Trehan sought refuge in an analogy, comparing roadside food with what is available in upscale establishments. “You may get equally tasty food at a dhaba as in a five-star hotel. But five-stars charge more, because they maintain hygiene. The same applies to hospitals. High-end hospitals focus a lot on cleanliness and take several precautions. It is therefore natural that their charges will be on the higher side.”
But it is not just government companies that are excluding hospitals from their preferred list. Bharti AXA, the private sector general insurance provider, too has trimmed its list of approved hospitals. “We found that some hospitals were fudging bills and so we removed these from our list. We have scaled down the number of hospitals we have a tie-up with to 3,800, down by 200. None of the big names have been excluded though,” says Bharti AXA Chief Executive Officer Amarnath Ananthanarayanan.
The only question nobody is asking is, should not the erring hospitals — big or small — be fined?
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HOSPITALS VERSUS INSURERS
>STRUCK OFF
150 hospitals were removed from state-run insurers’ Preferred Partner Network (PPN) list starting July 1
> MARKET SHARE
Government-owned companies account for 70 percent of the health insurance market
> CLAIM RATIO
For government companies, it stands at 116 percent
> GENERAL COMPLAINT
Bharti AXA General too reduces the number of affiliated hospitals
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Untapped Bounty

Abhishek Anand

17/07/2010

The promoters of Islamic banking hope to attract Shariah-compliant Muslims, reports Abhishek Anand

**Hefty returns ..**.but there’s no scope for investing in pure interest-bearing instruments

INDIA MAY soon allow Islamic banking or Shariah-compliant banking in the country. As a first step, the Reserve Bank of India is expected to permit some non-banking financial companies (NBFCs) to offer Shariah finance.
Globally, Islamic banking is growing at a rate of 15 percent to 20 percent, and according to a KPMG report, Shariah-compliant banking assets now stand at around $750 billion. Money raised by Islamic banking is typically invested in activity that is consistent with Shariah rules, which means not investing in companies dealing in liquor, gambling or sex. It also means not investing in pure interest-bearing instruments.
Shariah banking functions on a profit-sharing model, as opposed to the traditional interest-rate governed model. At present, close to 75 countries from Europe, North America and Southeast Asia have adopted the Shariah model that is largely aimed at Muslim investors.
“Some time back, the RBI showed willingness to let Islamic banking take roots in the country. If only on an experimental basis, it is likely to allow some NBFCs to start Shariah finance in the country, and depending upon the experience, it may extend the practice through formal banking channels,” says Hiresh Wadhwani, partner and national director, banking and capital markets, at Ernst & Young. But he adds the central bank will have to formulate regulations that safeguard the interest of customers.
The RBI has been considering the matter for quite some time now. The 2008 Raghu Ram Rajan Committee report on financial sector reforms had advocated introduction of Shariah banking in the country. Muslims constitute close to 13 percent of the country’s total population, but their share in overall deposit and credit stands at 7.5 percent and 0.5 percent, respectively. Shariah banking maybe able to attract much of these untapped resources.

Globally, Islamic banking assets stand at around $750 billion

Already, market regulator SEBI has allowed entry of Shariah-compliant mutual fund schemes in the country. Two companies — Taurus Mutual Fund and Benchmark Mutual Fund — have launched such schemes, providing substantial returns to investors.
“We have managed to provide a hefty return of 120 percent to customers in the last 15 months,” says an upbeat Waqar Naqvi, chief executive officer of Taurus Mutual Fund. During the economic downturn in March 2009, the fund was able to raise Rs 4 crore. But now, says Naqvi, the average assets under management stand at a respectable Rs 25 crore. And the consensus is that things can only get better.
The Kerala government too has allowed Shariahcompliant investment companies to channelise the considerable remittances they get from the Gulf. According to the KPMG report, Kerala receives remittances worth nearly $2.4 billion annually from West Asia. But a major portion of it is either lying in bank accounts or is used for investments in real estate and jewellery.

WRITER’S EMAIL:
ABHISHEK.ANAND@FWTEHELKA.COM